A Rather Large Difference
by sQuIsHeDbRoCcOlLi
Summary: Yachiru and Hitsugaya bring Matsumoto's mind out of the gutter with something a little less sterile than Dettol. Sequel to Something in Common, T for language


**Disclaimer:** nah, not mine, never ever.

* * *

The Taichou of the Tenth Division was annoyed, to say the least.

In fact, he was feeling quite irate.

For starters, Matsumoto was unsurprisingly, shirking her duties once again. For another, she had been harrassing him seemingly ceaselessly since thie little lizard incident. For main course came the sly, sneaky looks with The Eyebrow Waggle as well as the giggles. Finally, for the cherry and the whipped cream and whatever else it was (but definitely not baked beans, no matter what Inoue insisted), was the fact that the blasted woman happened to be using his desk as a footstool.

That was all fine and dandy, if it wasn't for the fact that it was his desk. For a moment he contemplated pouring ink down one pant leg while tossing tea down the other, but his rational side _had_ put up a rather convincing argument...

Besides, he needed the ink, not to mention the tea as well.

But on the other hand, it was just so, _so_ tempting.

It was at that climax of inner turmoil that Matsumoto decided to bring herself back to the world (as usual, Hitsugaya noted). 'Well, well, Taichou,' the overly-endowed woman purred from her perch. 'What are you doing?' she eyed the inkwell in his left hand and the tea in his right, both of which he quickly set down.

'Uh...paperwork? So if you could get your damned feet off my precious workspace...' he trailed off threateningly. Grabbing a particularly round paperweight, he began rolling the heavy stone at Matsumoto's foot with as much speed and accuracy he could muster with his left hand as he wrote.

Which, to say, was not as much as he would have liked.

Eventually, though, her left foot slipped off the table and her right, which had been resting atop her left ankle, followed suit and she fell bodily off the couch with a shriek. Smirking, he returned the little black stone to its position in the drawer. He really would have to thank Ukitake-taichou for it.

* * *

Kusajishi Yachiru was bored, and when she was bored, she tended to annoy people. With Ken-chan drunk, Feather-man in the toilet for the past hour or so and Pachinko annihilated, she figured it was best to victimise someone else's division.

Picking up her prized, glowing fluorescent purple lizard, she dropped it into a little box and rushed out to greet the world.

Without much thought, she flung herself through her favourite entrance to the Tenth Division, which oh-so-conveniently happened to be the window. 'Chibi-kun! Sake-lady! Are ya havin' fun? Doesn't life suck?' she barrelled into the couch and, Matsumoto noticed with a wince, made a dent in the floor under it.

'I got'cha a present!' the hyper little girl cried as she bounced off the couch. 'Chibi-kun has an orange one, and I have a pink one, so I decided to give Sake-lady the purple one! It was awfully fun, wasn't it, Chibi-kun?'

Hitsugaya nodded mutely, trying to figure out when they had caught the glowing pink lizard. The orange one and the purple one he recalled, but pink?

In fact, the orange one was currently in his drawer. Coming to the conclusion that Yachiru was pulling one of Matsumoto's long legs, he figured to play along and pull the other leg even longer than it needed to be, be it tea- or ink-soaked.

'Maybe we could do it again sometime soon,' Hitsugaya mumbled distractedly, pulling his disgruntled glowing orange lizard out of its drawer. Rising from his seat, he declared that he would be getting more tea and swiped the nearly-full cup off the table.

Casting a knowing glance in Yachiru's general direction, Hitsugaya left the little reptile on the back of the couch, right behind where Matsumoto sat before sweeping off to the kitchen, nearly spilling the tea in an attempt to control his laughter.

Once he had left, Yachiru perched herself atop the couch at Matsumoto's shoulder and, gently as she could, coaxed Hitsugaya's lizard onto the shoulder. She pulled several long orange locks around it and patted Matsumoto's head. 'One day,' she hesitated, formulating yet another grand plan in her small little head, 'I'm going to have lovely hair like Sake-lady.'

She arranged the hair nicely around the lizard to somewhat resemble a curtain and giggled. 'Long hair looks nice,' Yachiru concluded.

Presently, Hitsugaya returned with, presumably more tea. 'You haven't opened your present,' he pointed out, eyeing his lizard, which happened to be falling asleep amidst someone's hair.

Good point, Matsumoto realised. What exactly could it be that came in orange, pink and purple that both males and females could own? Besides that, there was the part that her Taichou and Yachiru had probably gotten them on their night out...

Curiously, she undid the knot in the grubby string and began to pry the lid off the box, and it happened to be at that exact moment when she had her hand in the box that Yachiru had suddenly stopped playing with her hair.

'Sake-lady? There's something funny in your hair...' Yachiru seemed to pale.

Hitsugaya hoped the blood was draining from his face too as he agreed with Yachiru.

In feigned fright, Yachiru flung herself off the top of the couch and landed roughly on the arm of the unfortunate piece of furniture, which succesfully jarred a certain purple lizard into clambering up the finger nearest to it.

Chaos were, of course, inevitable when Matsumoto peered into the box while a certain orange reptile made its presence known by cheeping loudly into her ear. Shrieking uncontrollably, the orange-haired Fukutaichou leapt hysterically. 'Help me find them! I am _not_ having a single one of these cretins near me!'

'Turn the lights off! Ya can find 'em better!' Yachiru shrilled, clicking the lights off.

'Pour tea on yourself. They may not like it,' Hitsugaya suggested lightly. Much to his surprise, the woman grabbed the proffered cup and doused herself.

Screeching, Matsumoto flounced out into the garden, refusing to return until both Yachiru and Hitsugaya had assured her, very calmly and solemnly, that a frightened orange and purple blur was seen waddling off into the night.

* * *

Two small figures crouched by a small drain behind the Twelfth Division. 'Catching lizards is fun. Pity we lost the purple and orange ones.'

'At least the entertainment was worth it,' and the two erupted into peals of laughter.

* * *

_author's note:_ a proper ending, as many had requested after I posted Something in Common. please review!


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